Origin
Jethro Dumont was born with a silver spoon in his mouth. The scion of one of Meridian's richest families, he had the best of everything from birth, just like the story books. And if the storybooks are to be believed, his great tragedy is that he only wanted for his parents' love and attention, but honestly, he had that too. Unlike the inevitable stories, Jethro didn't grow up to be a spoiled brat who squandered his opportunities. No, he was an earnest young man who worked hard to become one of the most promising architects in the country.

No, the tragedy of Jethro Dumont's life, if anything, was that he was born and raised in the Deco City. They say familiarity breeds contempt, and in Jethro Dumont's case, his contempt was directed at the city itself. Not its people, its look. He hated Art Deco. He hated old-fashioned buildings. He hated everything about the city's obsession with looking backwards. He hated that there were no suburbs, no modern buildings, no efficiency.

Kept in Meridian by his family ties, he strained at the limitations put on him by his clients, becoming more and more frustrated with each passing week. In retrospect, he should have just left town, and he probably would have, if not for the accident.

He'd gone out on the town with his fiancee, Julia Whitmore (the mayor's daughter) to a premiere at the Bowin Opera Hall. Sitting in the hall, all he could focus on were the inferior acoustics and the extraneous design elements. If only they would let him rebuild the inside of this hall with modern materials, the hoi polloi would finally know how an opera should sound.

Sadly, in some respects, he was right. The Bowin was outdated, especially its wiring and and fire control equipment. When the fire broke out over the stage at the end of the third act, the place went up like a tinderbox. Thousands panicked, hundreds died. It was the greatest single tragedy in Meridian's history.

Jethro Dumont was one of the survivors. When the flames fell on him, he burned, but he didn't burn. In a moment, Jethro changed forever. When the firefighters reached him, they found him dancing amongst the wreckage, laughing madly, and shooting flames from his fingertips.

Initially, the authorities thought he'd started the blaze. He was certainly mad, and raved about burning things down. Eventually, the true source of the fire was figured out, and the Dumont family connections allowed him to be quietly committed. Unfortunately, the security at the sanitarium was not nearly up to the task of holding him and he escaped within a week. His new mission in life: burn Meridian to the ground!